A lot of research goes into ensuring the humble spud is just right for the
table and doesn’t fall victim to the dreaded blight.

With potatoes, only a bit of research and understanding stands between starchy fillers and a gourmet experience.

The potato is one of our most versatile vegetables, and a well grown, well cooked, favourite variety takes a lot of beating. Gardeners, however, have been suffering from potato blight, so much so that in Scotland, where they have had three particularly bad summers on the trot which have ruined their main crops, sales of seed main crop potatoes have slumped.

I am not giving up growing spuds. Quite the reverse, but I have been carrying out more research with growers and chefs to maximise my flavours and yields.

First of all I spoke to Alan Romans, whose brilliant work The Potato Book has just come out in paperback. His growing advice is second to none. For instance, although received wisdom is that you must chit your potatoes for an early crop, he points out that chitting is technically called “premature ageing”, which hastens the beginning and, of course, the end. So you can, by chitting, reduce the potential yield. So maybe chit some plants, but not all. If you just chit them with the rose end up (the end with the dominant sprout) and remove the rest, you might get fewer, larger potatoes. Chitting is not essential and weather conditions are likely to be the biggest factor on earliness of crop.

Earthing up is another issue. It is a good way to remove weeds and prevents any green potatoes by excluding light. But I am not convinced it increases yields.

We get lots of questions about slugs and wire worms on Gardeners’ Question Time. You can grow resistant varieties, but they are not totally immune. Because the potatoes are underground, many slug treatments have low impact. Pippa Greenwood, who specialises in crop protection, uses “brilliant” Nemaslug to keep slug levels down in the soil. (For more pest control tips go to pippagreenwood.com).

When to lift your potatoes is another potentially confusing question. Not all varieties flower, so “lift on flowering” can be highly unproductive. With first earlies, which should be harvested fresh as required, Romans recommends “carefully feeling in the drill for small tubers about eight to 10 weeks after emergence”. Eat them fresh, small and with a loose skin. Supermarket “new potatoes” have a set skin because the tops are sprayed off with herbicide, the tubers are left in the soil for three weeks to firm, and they are harvested mechanically — a different product completely in appearance and taste.

Romans’s book makes little comment on the taste of the different varieties, other than that those with high dry matter (non-water content, mainly starch) absorb water and so can disintegrate when used for boiling. These potatoes tend to have a strong “potatoey” flavour. The high dry-matter potatoes do not absorb so much oil and fat, so crisp up well when fried or roasted. A good example is Maris Piper. Excellent salad potatoes have low dry matter and a good flavour, Charlotte being a great example (Greenwood’s favourite).

Romans points out that in wet summers, strangely, potatoes acquire a higher dry matter and that in the northern part of the country, the same variety of potato will tend to have a lower dry matter than in the south, partly due to the extra sunshine. The dry matter affects flavour and my Charlotte (in the East Midlands) might taste very different from a gardener’s Charlotte in Scotland.

I contacted Dr David Shaw, director of the Sárvári Research Trust in Bangor, north Wales, to learn about blight problems. Dr Shaw has been breeding and selecting the Sárpo blight-resistant varieties since 2002. Among those the Trust has produced are Kifli (excellent flavour), Axona, Sárpo Shona, Sárpo Una (lowest dry matter, crops in 65 days, salad and baking), Blue Danube (highly ornamental – beautiful blue flowers and good flavour), Sárpo Mira and Sárpo Gwyn.

Some gardeners criticised Sárpo Mira for poor flavour and not looking so good. Probably because these tough potatoes just keep on growing unlike many when the foliage dies down, so they are probably often harvested when way past their best.

Darina Allen, from the Ballymaloe Cookery School in Ireland, grows a lot of the Sárpo potatoes. She is extremely complimentary about them generally and rates their favour highly. She is especially keen on Kifli, Blue Danube (“They are very, very good — flowery, dry and very delicious indeed!”) and Sárpo Una. The other hugely useful characteristics are that they smother weeds as they have a strong canopy, they are resistant to viruses, and just keep growing indeterminately until the frosts, getting bigger and bigger. So you can lift some as new potatoes, and then go on lifting as you need them, being rewarded with bigger potatoes the longer you leave them. Due to their vigour, you will also get good results in dry summers.

Raymond Blanc has done comprehensive tests and trials for flavour and always grows Ratte, too. Anne-Marie Owens, Raymond’s head gardener at his two Michelin-starred Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons, always grows Kestrel on her own plot (with a clay soil). It seems resistant to slugs, produces a good, clean crop whatever the weather, and responds well to roasting, mashing, chipping or baking.

“Golden Wonders grown in Scotland have different characteristics from those grown in England,” he says. “The Desiree potato so favoured by Delia Smith is scorned in Scotland, because whilst it grows well in her native Norwich, it is very watery if grown north of the border. Good mashing varieties are my all-time favourite: Arran Victory, Red Duke of York or Maris Piper.”

For his signature mash, cut up 2kg Arran Victory potatoes, bring to the boil and simmer for five minutes. Then drain off all but 1cm of water, cover and steam in 150C/300F/Gas 2 oven for 30 minutes. When cooked, drain and place over a low heat to dry. Heat 500ml of full-fat milk and 150g butter until it melts and mash the potatoes briefly, adding salt, pepper and a little grated nutmeg. Finally, pour in the hot milk and butter mixture and use a balloon whisk to get really creamy.